I sat shaking with laughter AND crying watching Missy Franklin win her first Olympic Gold Medal less than 20 minutes after qualifying for another event. Here’s the amazing part.
She BARELY squeaked into the qualifying heat, making it by a few hundredths of a second.
Let me repeat that in case you missed it, a few HUNDREDTHS of a second.
She saved her energy expending JUST ENOUGH to qualify for the heat because 14 minutes later, she put her heart into that race, too, and won her first Gold Medal. What an incredible alignment of effort and outcome. Having spent almost 10 years swimming competitively I know first hand what competition feels like, although not quite at that level. Her efforts deserve all my admiration and then some. Which was some of my reaction to her win.
Here’s the really powerful part. For those who loved the movie ‘Chariots of Fire’ you will recognize the thought. Missy Franklin refused to turn professional, turning down a fortune in advertising dollars (that would go a long way to offsetting the thousands of dollars in taxes on her medals, let alone training and travel costs). She did it so that she could remain part of a team. She loved swimming for her high school team so much, she didn’t want to forego that same bonding experience in her college career. There will be time when she is in the next Olympics to turn professional, if it is meant to be.
The amazing part is she is 17 years old and making decisions that show so much wisdom. When you separate yourself from your heart, you lose your drive, your connection to our source of power. (Back to Chariots of Fire) What fuels Missy Franklin is far more than a quest for fame or fortune and she knows this already.
Our hearts have an electromagnetic field that extends out 3-8 feet from our bodies. Yep, they can measure it. Guess what? It extends only about an inch around our brain, no matter how high the IQ. That’s because our hearts have 100 times the electrical charge and 5,000 times the magnetic charge. That’s right, I said 5,000 times! Magnetism is what pulls things to us so we expend less energy chasing them down.
This is perhaps why the eighth spot in qualifying seemed effortless while Missy had just enough energy for the next event – her first Olympic Gold.
When we use our hearts first we draw things to us, they come with less effort, sometimes without any apparent effort. Not that the swimming they are doing is effortless, trust me. But winning a race like the one she swam right after another race is HIGHLY unusual. And Powerful. No wonder the sponsors were lined up to get to her – she radiates a magnetic enthusiasm that pulls you in whenever you watch her.
Which is where patience comes into play.
I can’t tell you how many times I have seen people jump to conclusions, rush to decisions and basically ratchet up the effort level in what they want, simply because the results have not come soon enough. Those with straight heart and head lines know exactly what I mean. It’s our coping skill with stress and takes support to rewire.
For everyone, our anxiety can creep up around what we want to create and there is little trust or patience available to let it all unfold. Think of Missy staring at the staggering cost of being an Olympian and the possibility of all that money through endorsements. But she wants her heart connection first. The rest will come when you start with your heart first. It has a way of magnetizing in other options that if you have the patience to wait for those choices to appear. It becomes a whole new game of what’s possible…Look at what she has magnetized so far by staying connected to her heart.
Now our straight heart lines know all too well what I am talking about here. The drum beat to do, act, make something happen or get confirmation that something is going to happen. You curved heart lines, well, not so much. In fact my short curved heart lines can take forever to make your decisions, endlessly weighing all the options to get it right. You long ones hesitate more on limiting yourself to any one course of action unless it is truly large scale.
However, we all have our hearts as our generators. Knowing what fuels your passion and staying connected to that, regardless of the temptations to cut off some of that expansion potential is the balance that will be the charge that lights you up and pulls more of what you want to you each and every day. It may not be an Olympic Gold, but it can surely make you stand out in your life.
